(“DELTA”)

PANNEKOEK, “STATE EXPENDITURE AND IMPERIALISM”

(x)“In my opinion, the contradiction between principled and reformist
tactics is that the latter
? ||
is too strongly determined by immediate
interests, by easily attainable and apparent results, and
sacrifices to them the inner strength of the proletariat.
Principled, Marxist tactics aim primarily at increasing the power of the
proletariat, thereby securing the highest positive results; for these
results, being concessions made by the ruling classes, depend primarily on
the power of the proletariat” (p. 111).

Andbefore the above passage:

(**)not the right word; not so ||2
“The essence of the socialist class struggle is inseparable unity of the
struggle for socialism (**) and representation of all the
immediate interests of the proletariat. Only the Party’s fight for the
current interests of the working class makes it the party of the
proletariat,
true! ||2
the party of the masses, and enables it to win victory” (x).

[BOX:]
[[
N.B. Pannekoek’s formulation of the question of reformism is
wrong.
]]

N.B.
[DOUBLE LEFT-TOP-RIGHT BOX END:]
Pannekoek has here posed a question of prime importance, but has
answered it badly—or, at least, inaccurately. “The unity of the struggle
for socialism and for reforms” or “and for the immediate
interests of the workers”? But what is the struggle for socialism? In
Pannekoek’s formula, the distinction between the Left and the “Centre” is
blurred, wiped out, has disappeared. Even Kautsky (who,
incidentally, made no rejoinder to this article of Pannekoek’s) would
subscribe to Pannekoek’s formula (the one given here). This formula is
wrong.
||
The struggle for socialism lies in the unity of
the struggle for the immediate interests of the workers (including reforms)
and the revolutionarystruggle for power, for
expropriation of the bourgeoisie, for the overthrow of the bourgeois
government and the bourgeoisie.

Whathave to be combined are not the struggle for reforms
+ phrases about socialism, the struggle “for socialism”, but two
forms of struggle.

Forexample:

1.Voting for reforms + revolutionary action by the masses....

2.Parliamentarism + demonstrations....

3.The demand for reforms + the (concrete) demand for revolution....

Economicstruggle together with the unorganised, with the
masses, and not only on behalf of the organised workers....

4.Literature for the advanced + free, mass literature for the more
backward, for the unorganised, for the “lower masses”....